4 ms·

This is what happens when a company stops having anything relevant to contribute and just becomes a bag'o'patents.

by pekk 14y ago

nivla 14y ago
>stops having anything relevant to contribute You mean like Lumia Phones, Nokia Maps, Nokia Free Music... I love their apps and hardware but I do however disagree with their stance on enforcing unnecessary patents!
- nitrogen 14y ago
  Nokia's still little more than a blip on the smartphone radar. Their alliance with Microsoft was an effort to save their smartphone division, and it's affecting other areas of their business. First they laid off the entire Qt team, now they're attacking open standards. It's like SCO all over again.
  - btilly 14y ago
    SCO worked out pretty well for Microsoft the first time. Years of distraction from a dead company, they got to pay off David Boise in return for his dropping the anti-trust case, and nobody successfully followed the money trail back to Microsoft in any way that mattered. Why wouldn't they try to do it again?
    - nitrogen 14y ago
      Why wouldn't they try to do it again? Indeed, but it still makes me wish I were born on Mars or something.
- anoncow 14y ago
  I like their subscription music service (Many labels are not available though). But this patent troll stance makes me feel that nokia is being used to fight unnecessary rivalries.
sgloutnikov 14y ago
Wow, how quickly people forget :D In 2010, Nokia was the 3rd ranked company in the world with regards to R&D spending ($8.2B). They hold more than 50% of the patents for 3G, and close to that for LTE. They also hold patents for thousands of other technologies. Nokia used to be a innovation powerhouse. They still try, just at a lower level. Look at their PureView technologies for example. Some of those billions need to come back somehow :) (Sued Apple, etc) Super bad management drove such a great company to its knees. It makes me sad. 7 years before Apple, Nokia shows off a color touch screen phone with one button, with more amazing features for its time--Management shuts the idea down. Here is a cool article worth a read of how things went sour at Nokia: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304388004577531002591315494.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230438800457753...
- w0utert 14y ago
  It almost looks like as soon as expensive R&D is done and someone made a copy or knock-off of some piece of technology, it had suddenly appeared out of thin air, and the original inventors/investors who made it possible are patent trolls because they aren't giving it away free for all. H264 vs VP8 is just like that, it took years and millions to get to the point where we are now, but hey it's not free (in some specific cases where you make money off of it yourself), so it must be evil and we should kill it with fire :-/

This is what happens when a company stops having anything relevant to contribute and just becomes a bag'o'patents.

by pekk 14y ago

This is what happens when a company stops having anything relevant to contribute and just becomes a bag'o'patents.

nivla 14y ago

>stops having anything relevant to contribute You mean like Lumia Phones, Nokia Maps, Nokia Free Music... I love their apps and hardware but I do however disagree with their stance on enforcing unnecessary patents!

nitrogen 14y ago
Nokia's still little more than a blip on the smartphone radar. Their alliance with Microsoft was an effort to save their smartphone division, and it's affecting other areas of their business. First they laid off the entire Qt team, now they're attacking open standards. It's like SCO all over again.
- btilly 14y ago
  SCO worked out pretty well for Microsoft the first time. Years of distraction from a dead company, they got to pay off David Boise in return for his dropping the anti-trust case, and nobody successfully followed the money trail back to Microsoft in any way that mattered. Why wouldn't they try to do it again?
  - nitrogen 14y ago
    Why wouldn't they try to do it again? Indeed, but it still makes me wish I were born on Mars or something.
anoncow 14y ago
I like their subscription music service (Many labels are not available though). But this patent troll stance makes me feel that nokia is being used to fight unnecessary rivalries.

sgloutnikov 14y ago

Wow, how quickly people forget :D In 2010, Nokia was the 3rd ranked company in the world with regards to R&D spending ($8.2B). They hold more than 50% of the patents for 3G, and close to that for LTE. They also hold patents for thousands of other technologies. Nokia used to be a innovation powerhouse. They still try, just at a lower level. Look at their PureView technologies for example. Some of those billions need to come back somehow :) (Sued Apple, etc) Super bad management drove such a great company to its knees. It makes me sad. 7 years before Apple, Nokia shows off a color touch screen phone with one button, with more amazing features for its time--Management shuts the idea down. Here is a cool article worth a read of how things went sour at Nokia: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304388004577531002591315494.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230438800457753...

w0utert 14y ago
It almost looks like as soon as expensive R&D is done and someone made a copy or knock-off of some piece of technology, it had suddenly appeared out of thin air, and the original inventors/investors who made it possible are patent trolls because they aren't giving it away free for all. H264 vs VP8 is just like that, it took years and millions to get to the point where we are now, but hey it's not free (in some specific cases where you make money off of it yourself), so it must be evil and we should kill it with fire :-/